John Schofield

John McAllister Schofield (29 September 1831-4 March 1906) was the US Secretary of War from 1 June 1868 to 13 March 1869, succeeding Edwin M. Stanton and preceding John Aaron Rawlins. He held many commands during the American Civil War, and he became famous for his defeat of the Confederate States in Tennessee and North Carolina from 1864 to 1865.

Biography
John McAllister Schofield was born in Gerry, New York, United States on 29 September 1831, and he graduated from West Point in 1853, 7th in a class of 52 graduates. He became a teaching assistant in the mathematics section after graduation, and he was nearly expelled for allowing for his students to write offensive messages on the board. From 1860 to 1861, he was a physics professor at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, and he became a Major in the 1st Missouri Infantry Regiment of the US Army when the American Civil War broke out. He served as Nathaniel Lyon's chief of staff until Lyon was killed at the Battle of Wilson's Creek in August 1861, and he was promoted to Major-General in November 1862. In April 1863, he became a divisional commander, and he took command of the Department of Missouri that same year. In 1864, he took command of the Army of the Ohio, leading it in Georgia before fighting against John Bell Hood's Army of Tennessee in the Franklin-Nashville  campaign of late 1864. His victory at the Battle of Nashville on 16 December 1864 ended the Army of Tennessee's ability to fight against the Union, and he invaded North Carolina in January 1865. Schofield captured Fort Fisher and Wilmington by February, and he ended the war alongside William T. Sherman's army. From 1868 to 1869, he served as US Secretary of War, and he was Superintendent of West Point from 1876 to 1881 and Commanding General of the US Army from 1888 to 1895. He died in 1906 at the age of 74.